The most recent question is “can you really get therapy on-line, on a blog?” Nope! But you CAN do exploration — ask yourself important questions, reflect, and continue the process of examining how you are doing and IF therapy would help you.
I’ll provide the questions! To start, if you have not read the past blogs on stress analysis, I’ll start you on the journey of analyzing your stress, one question at a time. You can also, if so motivated, return to the blogs (dates here) on stress analysis and “read ahead.”
If you want to explore slowly, here’s the first: Where ARE you when you are feeling high levels of stress? On the zero to 10 scale, with 10 the highest, where are you when experiencing stress at a level higher than 5?
Alone? With a partner/spouse? A family member? At work? With a particular person(s) at work? In Social gatherings — small or large? Going back and forth to work? When you try to go to sleep at night? When you first wake up in the morning?
OKAY, it’s more than one question …but it’s all PART of one question….
So begin with a notebook of some sort and answer this question. Write as much as you can with no attention to detail or punctuation or spelling…just thoughts. It starts a process of you paying attention, in a mindful manner, to specifically what is going on — when and where and with whom. You are isolating the difficulty. If writing feels good to you, keep going with any additional thoughts, insights, reflections. If you do NOT like the writing, and many people don’t, just make some notes so you don’t forget the insights you’re having.
And any time in this process of self-reflection you have questions or concerns think about who you are comfortable talking to …and do so. And you can always call me, leave a question, or request a phone call.
With this first question you are on your way to getting a handle on what’s going on that is more challenging than you want it to be. It works!